Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

By: Katie Lersch: Many wives dealing with infidelity believe that if they can get to a place of forgiveness, then complete healing will follow, and they can move on with their lives. While forgiveness can feel incredibly freeing and can be helpful to your marriage, it doesn’t always fix everything. Many wives are surprised to find that even after they’ve completed the very generous act of forgiveness, the spouse who cheated can still harbor resentments or frustration.

A wife might say, “Looking back at my husband’s affair, I can honestly say that for the most part, I’m proud of the way that I handled myself. Sure, I was furious and mean immediately after I found out. My husband and I didn’t speak for weeks. I was incredibly sarcastic and resentful for a few months. But we sought counseling, and I began to see that it was possible to move past this. So I worked very hard on myself and on my marriage. After some months of work, I finally decided that I wanted to forgive my husband and move on. So I told him that I forgave him and that I wasn’t going to hold a forever grudge. At first, he seemed touched by the gesture. But as time has gone on, he almost acts as if he doesn’t respect me or he implies that I am a pushover. I almost regret offering my forgiveness. He acts as if I am the one who has done something wrong. Why would he do this? Does he regret staying with me after he cheated? I haven’t guilted him or berated him about the affair in months. If anything, I’ve been more loving.”

Understanding Projection During Or After An Affair: Many wives in this situation assume that their husband is mad at them. And it may appear to be that way. Your husband may even believe this to be true. However, it’s more likely that your husband’s anger is directed at himself.
It’s much easier psychologically for him to take his anger out on you than to take an ongoing hard look at his own actions.

Many wives recount that when their husband was cheating, he actually acted as if he were suspicious of the wife’s behavior. This is classic projection. He knows that he’s not trustworthy during this time, but he’ll project that behavior onto his wife.

It works the same way after the affair. When he’s angry and disappointed in himself, he’ll act angry and disappointed with you even when you’ve done absolutely nothing wrong.

Sometimes, A Wife’s Positive Behavior And Forgiveness Make A Husband Feel That Much More Guilty: I think we can all agree that being open to healing and forgiveness is really the gold standard for a faithful spouse. Not everyone is willing to do this. Although your spouse can be very relieved and humbled when you are willing to forgive, he can also feel incredibly guilty.

He may rightly feel that he doesn’t deserve all of the grace you’re giving him. So again, this increases his frustration with and anger at himself, which he directs to you. He knows that he did something very wrong, so he indirectly treats you as if you did something wrong.

By identifying this, I’m not in any way insinuating that it is right or fair. It isn’t. But it is unfortunately very common.

Options For Dealing With This: As I see it, you have two options. You could have faith that as healing continues, your husband’s anger at himself will fade. As this happens, his projection will wane and he’ll stop lashing out. This requires nothing but patience.

However, some people are not able to sit passively by as they are being treated unfairly. So you have the option of trying to address this. You don’t want to react by exhibiting the same over-the-top lashing out behavior as your husband. That will only make things worse.

But you can calmly try something like, “your tone is hurtful right now. I honestly thought that after I forgave you, the tension and resentment would get better. That hasn’t happened. Can you share why? What have I done?”

Chances are, he’ll be forced to admit that you’ve done nothing. Once he makes this admission, try something like. “And yet you treat me as I have done something. This isn’t fair. I know that you’re disappointed and frustrated. This hasn’t been an easy time for either of us. But it’s unfair for you to take this out on me. It just makes everything worse. I want to move forward, not backward.”

Hopefully, once you’ve made him aware of his behavior, he will stop. You may have to continue to remind him if he resorts back to lashing out in times of frustration.

It may not seem like it right now. But your husband likely wants to move on every bit as much as you do. However, even though you’ve forgiven him, he may not have forgiven himself. That is why you are seeing this behavior. The best thing you can do it to continue to heal. As he becomes confident that you really have turned a corner and you can get through this, he will hopefully tone down his behavior and begin to focus on the positive.

I know all of this because I dealt with many similar issues after my own husband’s affair.  You can read about how we healed at https://surviving-the-affair.com

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